Man of the Year

With all this end of the decade talk, a lot of people are publishing the best of this and the worst of that lists. It's all a bit much so I decided to make a one person list of who to watch in the new year/decade. The most obvious answer is President Obama. Sure, he has a national crisis on his hands but it pale in comparison to the burdens of my nominee. Who is this champion of the people, this savior of the nation? None other than your boy from the 'hood, T-Pain.

T-Pain: Man of the Year 2009

For those unfamiliar with T-Pain, he is a a hip-hop and R&B artist who came on the scene as a solo artist in 2005 with his debut album, Rappa Ternt Singa. Also, he has a thing for top hats. Why, out of all the people in the world, did I choose T-Pain? It all started a few months ago when my friend and I were looking for a good taco place and discussing the status of the music industry. My friend brought up T-Pain and said he was a joke, at best a self-parody who always hides behind his top hat, sunglasses and massive grill. Plus, he always uses Auto-Tune, which corrects and/or distorts his voice. The more I thought about the guy, the more I agreed with my friend. But despite T-Pain seeming more artifice than true musician, I slowly came to appreciate his personal brand and approach to music. I'd much rather watch a self-aware rapper in a top hat than the aggressive posturing of other rappers. T-Pain seemed to be willing to bring a lighthearted spirit to the rap game and make a fine living doing it. 

 He's only 24 and has a record that has sold at least a million copies. To me, that's impressive. But more than just a seller of music, he seems very brand conscious and uses it to his advantage. By brand conscious, I mean he is self-aware of the image he is projecting and how that can be perceived and/or marketed to the general public. Look at 50-Cent with the Vitamin Water deal or Snoop with his T-Mobile commercials or Roca Wear and Baby Phat. Rappers were once the dangerous outcasts that lived and worked on the fringes of society and music. They were drug dealers and vandals who came off the streets and made music with lyrics like, "...motha fuck the po-lice..." and song titles like "Cop Killer." Now Snoop is on TV telling us we should buy a Sidekick. He's gone from gangster to lifestyle icon in the span of a few years. He's like the hip-hop version of Kramer, an eccentric, but lovable neighbor who, no matter what trouble he gets in, can always be forgiven with a knowing nod of an audience member's head. 

 T-Pain, being relatively young, grew up with fun-loving Snoop rather than thug Snoop. Tupac was killed when T-Pain was in the 5th grade.  When T-Pain was a kid rap was no longer a purveyor of social reform and a voice from the streets but a supplier of image and lifestyle. Music videos today are filled with rappers smoking cigars, driving Bentleys, and being surrounded by strippers. And through it all, the rappers keep a straight face. Their videos aren't fantasies but earnest aspirations, signs that the kid from the streets has made it in a big way. What I feel T-Pain brings to the scene is a sly wink. He is aware of how seriously rap takes itself and how ridiculous it can seem (If spotting Cadillac Escalades with rims and LCD screens were a drinking game, you'd be drunk in under an hour). 

 Some fans, however, have grown tired of the  rap cliches and want something new, In comes T-Pain with a a playful image and danceable tracks. One needs to only look at his album name (Rappa Ternt Singa) to understand his tone. My entire argument for T-Pain's greatness rests solely on two videos. One is for his song, "I Can't Believe It" and the other is for his guest appearance on SNL's digital short, "I'm on a Boat." 

"I Can't Believe It" is largely circus themed and begins with an image of T-Pain opening his palm to reveal a smaller T-Pain who begins rapping/Auto-Tuning his way into our hearts. Then, there's a close up of T-Pain where his top hat pops open to reveal three more T-Pains and a deer head wearing a top hat and shades. Later, a teddy bear with shades and a top hat shows up, along with contortionists, a Ferris wheel, and a largely unintelligible verse from Lil' Wayne. All of this done in a very trippy, Yellow Submarine like way where things just appear out of nowhere and explode from top hats. For the full effect, watch the video below.  

 The second video is "I'm on a Boat" which was done for Saturday Night Live and, as such, is meant to be funny and satirical. T-Pain, again decked out in shades and a top hat, hangs out with SNL's Andy Samberg and raps about how cool it is to be on a boat. I wouldn't even call what he does rapping. He's really just the featured artist/MC who repeats the words "I'm on a boat" about 200 times. But he's doing it while wearing a tuxedo and a nautical themed top hat. Most of the humor is derived from the lyrics and T-Pain is the lucky dude who gets to be featured in the video. His willingness to partake, however, proves his self-awareness both as a rapper and a promoter of his brand.

   

 There have been many a music video that includes rappers on boats (i.e. Jay-Z's "Big Pimpin'"). In true Hype Williams fashion (the director of "Big Pimpin'" and by the way, what happened to that guy?), the "Big Pimpin'" video features fish eye lens work, women in bikinis, and women in bikinis walking in slow motion for dramatic effect. We get it, Jay-Z. You're a bad ass. Mad props to you and yours.

By 2009 the whole rap music video aesthetic had become played out and predictable. Andy Samberg, along with his Lonely Island crew (Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer), capitalized on rap video's tired imagery and brought T-Pain along for the ride. Who else but a man whose entire career is based on self-parody could have been in that video? 

 Some might argue that that's all T-Pain is--self-parody. That's certainly what my friend said when we were looking for tacos. And maybe all T-Pain is is a carefully marketed hype machine with no real skills. But the man sells records And not just to people who saw him on SNL and picked up his album on a lark. He's also reaching fans who feel he's as legitimate as his gangster rap predecessors. Whether T-Pain is talented or not, he's still loved by millions and making money while living his dream. Looks like the joke is on us.

Another Tantalizing Tuesday

Lots of good stuff to report, some from the tech world, some from music, and some from art. How typical of me, wouldn't you say?

Wired Magazine's list of top 8 online mix tape distribution sites.





Article detailing St. Louis and their Complete Street Project. Finally, urban planning that de-emphasizes auto-centric streets.





New York Times article examining the state of conceptual art and the welcoming of former rebels like Jeffery Koons into the establishment.

Google Android is making a grab at the Ipod Touch market with their Archos 5. It looks incredible.

French illustrator over at Nesk.

Ever get tired of pie charts and PowerPoint presentations? Let David McCandless' new book, The Visual Miscellaneum show you information in a colorful new way.


As per the A.V. Club, Tegan and Sara's new album is awesome to the max. Also, Midlake and Los Campesinos! are coming out with new albums in 2010. Oh Huzzah!

Friday Night Links/P.J.'s Picks

Tatsuro Kiuchi

For those who don't remember, "P.J." stands for Philip Johnson. I picked him as my imaginary blogging buddy mostly because I've always enjoyed his trademark glasses and have respect for him as an architect. How can you not like a guy who hung out with Andy Warhol? As it so happens, I've been getting to know P.J. a little better thanks in part to my recent acquisition of The Philip Johnson Tapes. The book is a transcription of interviews with Johnson done in 1985 by Robert A.M. Stern. I have just started the book, but so far it's a very enlightening read. He really doesn't pull any punches when it comes to his opinions about anything. I anticipate a lively interview all the way through.

In other reading news, I just finished Nicholson Baker's, The Mezzanine. Though only 130 pages, it takes a while to go through in part because of Nicholson's extensive use of footnotes. I admit it got a little tiresome after a while, but his sustained concentration on minutiae is amazing. Most of the book revolved around the main character trying to figure out why both his shoelaces broke within a day of each other. He thinks about the different places of stress; at the knot, at the shoes' eye holes, along the toe, etc. in excruciating detail, but rarely do his thoughts become boring. He forces the reader to examine the everyday in a new light, often reexamining the mundane and finding something wondrous about it. How often do you read an author who cares deeply about paper towels vs. air dry hand dryers in public bathrooms? I enjoyed the book, but it is not for everyone. It takes a certain patience, one I admittedly didn't always have.

During breaks in my reading of Baker, I read a short story collection by Jim Shepard called, Like You'd Understand, Anyway. It is one of the most consistent short story collections I've read recently. Normally, a collection has a few gems, a lot of decent, but not great stories, and a couple that are just bad. Shepard held a tight grip on his material and never let it falter, even as he skipped around through history tackling such time periods as Chernobyl era Ukraine, Hadrian's Wall era Roman Empire, and the French Revolution. Shepard's stories, which largely revolve around father/son/brother relationships, always stay emotionally grounded. He never lets the historical period take control of the story. It doesn't matter what year the story takes place, relationships between men are always they same and, in Shepard's worlds, always failing. Definitely a book worth checking out, even if you aren't a big lit reader. It's very straightforward and lacks any kind of tricky post-modern elements. It's just a solid read. Period.


Last weekend Treasure Island, in the San Francisco Bay, held its second annual music festival. The island was originally built in 1939 for a World's Fair and fell into disuse shortly after World War II. There was been a lot of argument over the years about what to do with the man made island. Current plans call for a small sustainable city to be built. San Francisco always seems to be the most progressive West Coast city when it comes to social policy. Some message board posters have criticized the city for concentrating too much on environmental issue while ignoring larger concerns such as crime and safety. While I certainly don't want crime, I think that's something I'd rather put up with than cancer induced by chemical/pollutant exposure.

Forgot how I found the site, but The Projectivist is a great blog about art and graphic design.

Tatsuro Kiuchi is a Japanese illustrator of immense talent. In addition to his portfolio site, he also has a blog. Check it out, yo!

The Metro Library and Archive has an online database of Los Angeles maps, each detailing proposed public transit routes over the years. It gets depressing when you realize L.A. could have had its "Subway to the Sea" way back in the 1970's.

Syllabus for the Net Generation via McSweeney's.

San Francisco's plastic bag ban has worked and might be extended to include banning paper bags, some residents pissed.

Barnes & Noble is taking dead aim at Amazon's Kindle with their new e-reader device, Nook.

When was the last time you talked to your cousin, Frodo?

"Good Magazine" Associate Editor and all around swell guy Patrick James has a Twitter. Read it before it reads you.

Friday Night Links/P.J.'s Picks: Monday Edition

I finished Michael Chabon's Maps and Legends: Reading and Writing Along the Borderlands over the weekend. Not the most interesting book in the world. The first essay,"Trickster in a Suit of Light , starts the book on a high note as it explains Chabon's stance on so-called "genre fiction" and "literature." The premise of the essay was that entertainment has gotten a bad rap over the years because we have limited its definition. Entertainment has come to mean mindless action movies and formulaic sitcoms. That isn't all entertainment is and can be, that's just what we've let it become. Writing, Chabon contents, is also entertainment and that giving writing such a label isn't derogatory, but merely a description of its basic function. He says, "I'd like to believe that, because I read for entertainment, and I write to entertain. Period."

He goes on to define entertainment in its broader sense and finds it quite apropos when applied to writing.

"The original sense of the word "entertainment" is a lovely one of mutual support through intertwining, like a pair of trees grown together, interwoven, each sustaining and bearing up the other. It suggests a kind of mid-air transfer of strenght, contact across a void...I can't think of a better approximation between reader and writer."

The above quote is more or less the thesis for the entire collection of essays, though I felt it wasn't always supported all that well. A couple of the essays were only five or six pages long including, "Landsman of the Lost" which was about American comic strip writer Ben Katchor. The essay gives a brief account of how and why Chabon is interested in the man and then talks about what he did for the essay's remaining four or five pages. This essay, like many in the collection, felt cursory, more recollections than analysis. Chabon often talks of his childhood and liking comics and having various religious and identity crises, but none of it felt all that personal. I never felt that I was getting to know him better as a writer. The essays felt like facts, I was getting a list of things Chabon likes without really understanding their relationship to him or his writing.

The most compelling essay, "Imaginary Homelands," deals with Chabon's Jewish identity as awriter, how that informs his writing, and how an essay he wrote about a Yiddish dictionary angered a lot of scholarly Jews. It was the first time I felt Chabon was intimately discussing something that was important to him and how personal aspects of his life affected his public output as a writer. Plus, it dealt with etymology and language, which is always a point of interest to me. I wouldn't say this essay alone is worth the cost of the book, but it does finally reveal something about the author, which I had been waiting 157 pages for. I have not given up on Chabon as a fiction author. I've read his short story collection A Model World and hope to pick up Wonder Boys sometime soon. In the meantime, I'll stick to other more convincing essayist fare.



LINKS:

Good Magazine has several good articles, one of which claiming that 2009 is one of the best years for the novel we've seen in a while. Pynchon's new novel, Inherent Vice, is proof enough. For a list of must-read novels from 2009, none of which I've read (for shame!), click here.

The lucky bastards in Belgium have not only a kick ass train system, but a new central terminal decigned by Santiago Calatrava.

A new study has found that Mother Earth has tapped out and it's all because we put her in a choke hold. Now we're all going to die. Good going, citizens of Earth.

826 National, in addition to offering outstanding free tutoring services to children around the country, also has an unbeatable line of products including antimatter, robot emotions, and existentialist wine. To celebrate the organization's amazing products and its design/development team, 826 has put out a book entitled, Essentially Odd. It can be purchased at the 826 National website.

Friday Night Links/P.J.'s Picks

My reading streak continues at a rapid clip. This week's schedule includes Denis Johnson's Jesus' Son, Nicholson Baker's The Mezzanine and Michael Chabon's, Maps and Legends. I've found that reading three books simultaneously isn't nearly as distracting or disorienting as I had previously found it to be. I think it helps that one book is a short story collection and the other essays, making it easier to keep track of the information. I find switching between books at a whim makes their respective writing styles richer and more distinct. Each book's style helps set off the next. Plus, it allows me a break if the reading gets too intense. While entertaining and thoroughly enjoyable, sometimes the minutiae obsessed Baker can get a little taxing, so I switch over to the more direct prose of Johnson. Anyway I slice it, I feel my reading is worthwhile both in entertainment value and as templates for my own writing.

In Nor Cal news, the new Bay Bridge is rushing toward completion which means the old Bay Bridge is nearing its end. Fear not concerned citizens, the entire bridge is not being torn down, just the eastern span that stretches from Oakland to Yerba Buena Island. The stretch from Yerba Buena to San Francisco is staying intact save for some seismic retrofitting. The new eastern span is being dubbed a Skyway because it lacks the caged support system of the current bridge and affords uninterrupted views of the Bay.

The official Bay Bridge construction website has all the details, including the eventual dismantling of the eastern span. However, as Newton's Third Law of Motion states, "for every action there is an opposite and equal reaction." What is the reaction you ask? Well, many forward thinking city planners are proposing to keep the old eastern span of the bridge and turn it into a hanging city of sorts, similar to that of New York's High Line. There is also some historical precedence to the idea which is outlined quite extensively in both Streetsblog San Francisco and BldgBlog.

I'm unsure of how practical it would be to build a city on a structure deemed unsafe to drive across, let alone live on. There are lots of kinks to work out, obviously, but it's a forward thinking plan that promotes reuse rather than outright destruction which works on both an economic and historic preservation level. I highly doubt that plan will ever happen, but it can only help in the ongoing fight against waste.

Last year I went to D.C. and spent a lot of time looking through the various Smithsonian museums as well as all the usual touristy places. A museum i failed to go to only because I didn't know existed until late last week was the National Building Museum. How cool is that? I feel all giddy and geeky just thinking about it. le sigh. le swoon. Perhaps if I had explored ArchiAtlas earlier I might have known.

Bonus Link:
Grain Edit is a graphic design fetish site that focuses on work from the 1950's through the 1970's. Most excellent.

Friday Night Links/P.J.'s Picks: Monday Edition

Los Angeles has been called a city without a center, a sprawling metropolis with no real core. There is nothing within downtown L.A. that draws people in. Other major cities around the country like New York, San Francisco, or Chicago have urban cores that are more than just high rises, but a vibrant part of the cities' social and cultural scene. There is a mix of business and residential districts that keep larger swaths of the city vibrant and open beyond the 9-5 business hours. Los Angeles' downtown largely lacks such dynamism. Bunker Hill, the new downtown, is all office buildings and offers little in the way of social activities. MOCA, located in the heart of Bunker Hill, offers evening programs and the Grand Avenue Redevelopment Project offers some hope, but those plans are a long way off especially during our economic crisis.
The latest project to bring some vitality to downtown is the L.A. Live complex just across from the Staples Center. The entertainment behemoth includes L.A. Live Nokia Theater, Club Nokia, Lucky Strike Lanes, Nokia Plaza, the Conga Room, and a move theater. And opening sometime in 2010 is the L.A. Live Ritz Carlton.



OPENING PARAGRAPH of L.A. LIVE MAIN PAGE

Imagine being "in the moment" - when nothing else matters but what is going on around you right then and right there. It is when you experience something so fully you do not think about it or analyze it, you just enjoy it. The moment is that magical place where you scream the loudest, laugh the hardest and live the fullest. This is the L.A. LIVE experience. As a one-of-a-kind entertainment campus, L.A. LIVE is a genuine world-class sports and entertainment destination where one can experience moments like this all the time.

Nokia Plaza. Photo courtesy L.A. Live gallery

The disturbing thing about this promotion is...well pretty much everything about it is disturbing. The whole selling point of the facility is its ability to overwhelm and dumbfound the visitor with so much spectacle that they don't have the time or energy to criticize it. L.A. Live is all spectacle. But what of substance? They have a bowling alley, a theater, two concert venues. It is, as their material says, "a world-class sports and entertainment destination..." Is that what Los Angeles needs? Is that what any city needs? A destination? A destination implies that one travels there, experiences the destination, then leaves. It is an insular experience because everything is located within the campus. While L.A. Live may be booming, what about neighboring businesses, what of the neighborhood around this entertainment campus?

Anyone who has taken a walk down Figueroa St. knows that the area around L.A. Live, Staples Center, and the L.A. Convention Centers isn't pedestrian friendly. It's filled with chain linked parking lots, granite lined office buildings, and buckled sidewalks. Everything is fine within these insular entertainment destinations, but the surrounding streets are left to fend for themselves. These new civic centers that are popping up all around Los Angeles only serve themselves rather than the community at large. They are too busy being destinations rather than integral parts of both the business and cultural structure. Just look at Universal City Walk, The Grove, Americana, The Block at Orange, and the Irvine Spectrum. All of these locations, two of which were designed my maverick developer Rick Caruso (The Grove and Americana), are mini cities unto themselves; a recreation of urban life within the confines of a highly monitored and regulated environment. It is inauthentic and separates it itself from surrounding businesses by way of massive parking lots and high walls. Even with the inclusion of apartments within these facilities, they are still destinations. They are still only places to visit and then leave.

One only has to look at areas like Old Town Pasadena or The Orange Circle, or Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade or any number of small town business districts to find prime examples of retail and restaurant expansion within a pre-existing infrastructure. The benefits of such a system allow for greater integration around the new businesses. The community itself is being upgraded, not just one development. Shops open up, people are out on the streets, crime goes down. The business district expands and more parts of the city get redeveloped and fixed up and become profitable for the region.

The current development trend in Los Angeles gives people few reasons to stay in the area beyond that initial "destination." There is no chance of roaming to other nearby attractions because there are none. There is nothing immediately outside of L.A. Live worth seeing save for a late night meal at The Pantry. City Walk is on a hill, The Grove and Americana all have restaurants within them and are protected from the city by parking lots and apartment buildings. Why recreate a downtowns when there is one already that already exists? One that can be made vibrant and exciting. Perhaps only a novelty plan, but there are talks of bringing a trolley system to run through sections of downtown. This system would allow the burgeoning downtown scene to be traveled more easily and frequented by more people. With Tom Gilmore's big push for lofts in downtown, the older bank and financial districts are becoming filled with residents. Bars are opening up, blogs are being made, and supermarkets are being opened; all signs that downtown, as it stands, is a viable option for future development without sinking millions into flashy and clandestine entertainment centers.

Sadly, most development strategies are based on the bottom line and not much else. It's understandable that investors would want their businesses to succeed, but at what cost is that success coming? What is the long term viability of such a plan if the neighborhood it is built in is going to seed? Westwood Village saw a sharp decline in business after a shooting in 1988. It has bounced back since then, but there is still a stigma attached to the area. How long before something happens to an L.A. Live concert goer walking to their car? What then will happen to these entertainment meccas? In a development plan that includes pre-existing businesses and buildings, everyone will have a vested interest in the area's success and safety. Everyone looks out for each other. City business councils will be created and the business owners will have a say in their future rather than being pushed around by multi-million dollar corporations.

Old Town Pasadena has gone through a remarkable transformation in just under ten years and is continuing to fight for causes it feels important, namely the preservation of small businesses rather than introduction of large chains. Pasadena has realized the stakes involved and has risen to the occasion. It seems L.A. has not yet realized what is at stake and has taken short term financial success of long term viability. It is more than just a question of finance, it is a question of quality and substance. Los Angeles has long battled with critics who claim the Hollywood aesthetic has tainted the culture and turned it into something flashy and cheap. Navel-gazing projects like L.A. Live only lend credence to that claim and proves the city has yet to really care about its heart and core, it has yet to really become anything more than just overwhelming spectacle.

P.J.'s PICKS

I have yet to find the article comparing Chicago to L.A., but basically it says both cities have very similar problems and Chicago is dealing with them in a much more productive manner. Millennium Park and the new Renzo Piano addition to the Institute of Art are proof enough. How did Chicago get so far ahead? One needs to look no further than the past for answers. Specifically, Daniel Burnham's 1909 Plan of Chicago. In honor of its 100th anniversary, Chicago hired Prtizker Award winning architect Zaha Hadid to design a temporary installation in Millenium Park.

Los Angeles was never graced with a master plan, nor was it limited by space like New York or San Francisco. Perhaps that's why it lacks a core. Be that as it may, there were several attempts at urban planning during the city's early days, none of which did much. Information on L.A.'s central plaza and Olvera Street can be found here.

To keep track of urban news in Los Angeles look no further than Every Block Los Angeles, which gives real time news updates based on zip code.

For eco-living tips and L.A. street news, check out Green Girl L.A. and L.A. Streets Blog.

Ever wonder why Wells Fargo has such high interest rates on their credit cards? How else do you expect their execs to party in Malibu?

A quick rundown of Disneyland's ticket prices. Who says money can't buy happiness? Certainly not Disney.

Do you ever listen to folk duos who were popular in the 1960's and wonder what the less popular member of the group likes to read? I know I do. For a full list of books Art Garfunkel has read between 1968 and 2007, please click here. For a list of his all time favorites, click here. For a blistering new track by Macho Man Randy Savage, click here.

Friday Night Links: Saturday Edition

Thanks to a recent revisit to Hipster Runoff I came across some rather distressing news. No, Animal Collective hasn't broken up, but Ikea has changed their catalog font from time honored Futura to Veranda. Idsgn has the scoop. There's a tremendous backlash within the fontography community but as Ikea spokeswoman Camilla Meiby said in an interview with AP, "We're surprised, but I think it's mainly experts who have expressed their views, people who are interested in fonts. I don't think the broad public is that interested." Well that may be true, but it doesn't make it any less outrageous. OUTRAGEOUS, I say! For those of you who aren't hip to the differences between Futura and Veranda, the link posted above has a handy side by side comparison.

Overall, I think Futura is a cleaner Sans Serif font when compared to Veranda. And, as one commenter noted, using Veranda make the ads looks like they could have been printed by anyone with a computer, while Futura held a distinctiveness that was associated with Ikea. Idsgn also has a primer on Futura for those looking for a little something extra. Need even more typographical knowledge? Head on over to Typophile that, among other things, has a story about a woman getting fired for sending emails in CAPITAL LETTERS. Outrageous, I say. OUTRAGEOUS!

In other less exciting and more disgusting news, I came across a couple videos on YouTube that have made me question what it is to be human. The first is a video for something called the Neti Pot. Perhaps you've heard of it. If not, here is the video:



If that weren't enough I also found a hilarious video of a zit getting squeezed. Is it wrong that I am entertained by this late into the night?



For the music lovers out there, and you know who you are, the cover for the Monsters of Folk album has been been released and can be seen here. A band with M. Ward and Conor Oberst? Could it be true? Yes, yes it is. Try not to wet yourself. The records hits stores Sept. 22.

Lastly, a random endorsement for an author I've never read. Tao Lin.